This I Swear

FOR SUSAN DOOLEY

and she knows why

Table of Contents

FOR SUSAN DOOLEY

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EPILOGUE

COME SOFTLY TO ME

About the Author

1

One man, or one woman, is a significant being. A child of God, made in His image. Free of mind and will and spirit. Unique in his own right. Individual in his talents and temperament. Give him a partner, and you cut that in half. Put him on a committee or in an association or on a team, and you reduce him to just another cog in the gear, his individuality smothered. Granted, if he fails or breaks down, the gear fails, the machine stops. In that regard, he is important. But important as regards the others, not himself. He has been stripped of his own uniqueness and lumped together with his comrades.

That is one reason, but only one, why I live alone on an uncharted island in the Bahamian Atlantic east of Bimini. Free of the collective and absent the hysterical need to be socially connected.

So I left Stubby Dane that night at the Gin Mill and walked in the dark up the coral path toward my shack on the beach. The Dane screens my phone calls and had received one from a representative of a noted British billionaire. Somali pirates had hijacked the Brit’s one-hundred-fifty-foot luxury yacht. The Brit was not on board at the time. His wife and two grown daughters were. The pirates held them hostage for a while, and then, for reasons unknown, murdered the women and the captain of the vessel. The British billionaire had called to request my services. Said he wanted justice. Price would be no object.

The coral path to my place wound up a low knoll of grass and leveled off just before the shack. I paused on the flat and gazed out over the ocean. The only sounds were those of the waves dropping on the sand. I couldn’t see them, the waves, but I could hear them. Nor could I see the ocean, nor where it met the night sky. The air smelled of salt and sea, and stars were beginning to appear overhead. The grass ran down the other side of the knoll to the beach. The island is small, sparsely populated, isolated, and quiet. I stood there on the flat for a moment, maybe more than a moment, and gave thanks for the serenity of the evening.

At the house, I put a classical piece on the sound system and carried a drink and the iPad out to the porch overlooking the sea. The music was Debussy’s La Mer; the drink, three fingers of bourbon over two ice cubes. The sea was dark, the sky was dark, and the two were married roughly three miles out along the horizon. I couldn’t see the horizon, but I knew the geometry.

I call the place my shack, but it is actually a three-bedroom house with all the modern amenities and a lot of driftwood veneer over a cinderblock and concrete frame. Built rock solid, but rather plain and unpretentious. The hurricanes won’t damage it. The porch is wide and roofed over to protect from the sun on good days and the rain on wet ones. Limestone on the floor, paddle fans on the ceiling, and the whole affair is screened for the nights when I sleep out.

I settled into a modified and heavily padded Adirondack chair and set the drink on the wide arm. The iPad required no lamplight, so I left the porch dark, sipped the drink, and reveled in the music while the screen booted.

The Dane had said the name of the yacht was the Skyliner, so I Googled it and came up with a couple million hits. Narrowed it down to the pirate attack and found what I was looking for. It was a CBS news piece, somewhat superficial, but with enough information to provide background. The tone of the article indicated the journalist was incredulous that the ship had been there in the first place. As if it were the fault of the ship owner and the captain that the owner’s wife and daughters had been murdered.

A luxury yacht, the Skyliner, flagged in Great Britain and apparently clueless about the dangers of sailing Somali waters, was commandeered by seven pirates in the Gulf of Aden yesterday. The vessel, owned by British billionaire Arlo Taylor, had been on a return trip from the Seychelles up through the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean. The International Maritime Bureau advises sailors concerning the extreme danger of entering harm’s way in the shipping lanes of the Aden, but the Skyliner failed to heed those warnings.

Still awaiting details, investigators know two small skiffs with outboard motors approached the luxury yacht, pulled even and fired AK-47s into the air in an effort to paralyze the crew and force the vessel to stop. Apparently, upon sighting the approaching speedboats, the ship’s captain radioed a distress signal that was picked up by nearby warships, among them a United States guided missile frigate.

The pirates boarded the Skyliner and forced the crew of three, two men and a woman, into the engine room. The wife of the ship’s owner and her daughters were held in the wheelhouse along with the captain of the ship. The pirates turned the vessel and set a course for Puntland in eastern Somalia, where officials assume they planned to negotiate a ransom for the hostages.

Pursued by military force, the pirates reportedly panicked and everything about the mission went terribly wrong. A rocket-propelled grenade fired from the Skyliner and aimed at the American frigate, missed but prompted a response. Speedboats were dispatched to the yacht. By the time the sailors reached the Skyliner, the pirates were gone and the hostages were dead.

I eased back in the Adirondack and sipped the bourbon. Debussy was into the second sketch of La Mer, the Play of Waves, and while I sat there looking out over the Atlantic, I mused that it was actually the gentler Mediterranean that Debussy was describing, first performed in 1905.

I took some more of the booze and wondered why the pirates had killed the captain and Mr. Arlo Taylor’s wife and daughters. Or why they thought they had to kill them. If they feared the military closing in on them, could they not have just fled, as they did anyway? Was there an ulterior motive for the murders? Or was it just a wonton act of violence?

Perhaps tomorrow I would know.

2

At seven the next morning, I was sitting at the bar in the Gin Mill, a bloody mary on a small square napkin in front of me. It had been a fine night, though a little cool. Slept on the porch daybed with the covers and a quilt up over my ears until the first rays of sunlight filtered through the screens and washed bright orange over the porch and everything on it.

You have a plan? said the Dane.

First I see Arlo Taylor, then a plan.

Of course, said the Dane.

Sunlight slanted over the harbor and cast the tall masts of the schooners in long stick shadows across the adjacent boats and piers. In the cool air of the morning, a mist rose lazily from the warm seawater as the day got under way.

Did some checking last night, said the Dane.

He was short, maybe five six, wore leather sandals and a white chef’s apron over a black T-shirt and khaki shorts. He was bald on top, crew-cut gray hair around the rim. His eyes were cornflower blue and gentle and belied the aggressive nature lurking beneath the quiet surface. High school football teammates called him Stubby and the name stuck.

White man in Somalia, he said, "especially an American white man, doesn’t stand a chance. I’m not talking about you having problems finding the pirates; I’m talking about you getting dead. In which case, half my hard booze sales evaporate overnight."

The Dane would have peeled that information from the elite investigative agency he runs, called the Data Den. It’s housed in an acre of space behind the bar in the back of the Gin Mill and has every modern techno-gadget known to man. Employs a handful of MIT and Stanford technophiles who juggle computers and software programs as easily as the rest of us juggle the toggle switch to turn on the ceiling light in the bedroom. Most of the work is legal, but, if necessary, they can hack into AT&T, Verizon, state and federal tax logs, DMV records, frequent-flier accounts, and whatever databases might be required for a client.

Tell me about it, I said.

The fuck do I know, said the Dane. He pushed a button under the bar top.

Presently, John Aiken came through from the back. Aiken was a twentysomething fellow with long, curly hair pulled back into a low ponytail. Slim but not skinny. Two-day beard. Chiseled facial features and a high forehead. Manly. He wore a white T-shirt, jeans, and sandals. One of the computer guys. I knew Aiken and I knew he ran the Data Den.

Tell him about Somalia, the Dane said.

Aiken extended his hand and shook mine. He was about my height, his grip firm, and his eyes looked directly into mine. He was full of self-confidence, radiated intelligence, and wore a rawhide bracelet on his left wrist. He leaned on the bar and looked at me.

Spent most of the night messing around with Somalia, he said. At the Dane’s request.

All night? I said.

Had to hack a couple sites, interrupted the Dane. Do that only at night. All night long if we need to. Go through a computer in the Netherlands and back through computers in several other countries.

Several other countries, I said. Makes it hard to trace you.

Makes it a challenge, but if they’re really excited about finding us, they can do it, can trace us.

He nodded toward John Aiken.

Somalia has the longest coastline in Africa, said Aiken. Over one thousand miles. Oil and gas reserves on a big scale.

Makes the country potentially rich, I said. The energy reserves.

Aiken nodded. Potentially, he said. But not for real. Somalia is a failed state.

Failed state, I said.

Its political structures have failed.

Might be good, I said. To be rid of politics.

No, said Aiken. It is never good. You get rid of legitimate politics and something fills the void. It is an inevitable fact of life. What fills the void is what you see in Somalia. No rule of law. Not quite anarchy, but close. And violence. The citizens have no confidence in their own state because the state can’t deliver on the promise of goods and services.

And they hate America, I said.

Some do, said Aiken.

He took a paper napkin from the bar and drew the number seven. He split the vertical leg in half with a horizontal line, then drew a vertical line splitting the horizontal crossbar from the leg.

The country is shaped like the number seven and split into three regions. The southern half of the vertical leg is what most people have in mind when they think of Somalia. Mogadishu is here— He tapped the napkin roughly halfway down the vertical leg of the seven. It borders the Indian Ocean. It’s the largest city and capital of the country.

Black Hawk Down, I said.

Yes, said Aiken, "1993. Dragged our soldiers through the streets. A large al-Qaida faction rules the region now and, yes, they hate America.

"But above this region, the top half of the vertical leg of the seven, is an area known as Puntland. It is a semiautonomous region and is where most of the piracy originates. There is a city in Puntland called Galkayo. If I can believe the result of last night’s hacking, the name means where white man runs away."

Good grief! I said.

Serious business, he said.

I nodded.

The third region, said Aiken, tapping the upper bar of the seven, "covers most of the horizontal crossbar. This is Somaliland, the most civilized of the three regions. Somaliland considers itself an independent country but, to its dismay, no one else does.

It’s not recognized as such by any other government? I said.

None, yet it takes care of its own national defense, delivers goods and services to the people, has a foreign minister, a democratic political system, and a legislature.

But it’s a failed state, I said.

Not Somaliland, but the other two thirds of the country, yes. And failed states like Somalia are great havens for terrorist outfits that might launch attacks on developed countries.

You mean launch missiles or bombs or whatever from Somalia, I said.

Aiken nodded, moved two steps down the bar, and squirted soda pop from a unit on the back bar into a beer glass. He came back.

Terrorists need areas where they can work undisturbed, plan missions, train fighters, and equip jihadists with no government looking over their shoulders. In this case, Somalia. Breed new terrorists right there and export them to Western countries.

America being one, I said.

Exactly, said Aiken.

He sipped soda pop from the beer glass.

A terrorist group called Al-Shabaab controls the rural territories in the southern half of the country around Mogadishu. And Al-Shabaab hates America.

Which is why an American citizen enters the country at risk.

Correct, he said, then drained the beer glass. Anything else?

I can’t get into Somalia? I said.

You can fight bad guys, said the Dane, but not a whole country. You can get as close to it as Djibouti.

Chara did the work on that, said Aiken. I’ll send her out.

3

Chara was a delightful young woman of Bahamian descent. She looked to be eighteen, but the Dane had told me while we waited that she had a master’s in computer science from MIT, which would have placed her at mid-twenties. She came from the back and directly to me. She offered her hand, smiled cheerfully, and said, Good morning, Mr. Sloan. I’m Chara. I hear you have a challenge. She held an iPad in her left hand.

Her voice was Anne Murray alto and her features were hard although pleasant. She had the brown skin of the Bahamian native and the accent to go with it. Her face was long, the forehead high, hair pitch black and worn neatly in a tight afro.

Challenge ain’t the word for it, said the Dane. He’s up shit creek without a paddle.

You speak in clichés, Mr. Dane, she said.

Her respectfulness was refreshing in a time of first-name mania. She wore a white scoop-neck T-shirt loose over pale yellow shorts. Leather sandals on the feet. Her body had all the appropriate curves in the appropriate places, neither exaggerated nor diminutive. Appealing.

Problem is, said the Dane, he needs to capture pirates in Somalia but can’t get in without serious risk to his life.

Chara turned toward me. Her eyes were large, black, and penetrating, the nose neither large nor small, the lips moderately generous. She wore no makeup and no jewelry. I had the feeling she was self-assured and reliable, that I could trust what she was about to tell me.

All hope is not lost, she said. You can get as far as Djibouti and work from there.

Djibouti? I said.

You’re familiar with the Horn of Africa? she said.

Where it is, I said. Googled it last night.

She set the iPad on the bar top, tapped it open, and pulled up a map of the Horn.

Djibouti lies here, she pointed to it, where the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean meet. The country is called Djibouti. The capital city, where you would go, is also called Djibouti. It is a developing country with anywhere from fifty to sixty percent unemployment.

Good grief! I said. Sixty percent?

Developing, she said. The country was for a long time a French colony, but gained independence from France in 1977. In that year, the U.S. set up an embassy there. The Djibouti government has one in Washington, an embassy. Good relations between the two countries. The United States has a military base on the grounds of the airport, and the Djibouti government has been friendly toward U.S. interests. All of which means you should not have trouble there.

Language? I said.

Arabic and French, but you should be able to get along in English.

Religion?

Better than ninety percent Islam, she said.

Weather?

When you’re there? Probably no rain at all. Average high one hundred, average low, ninety.

Whoa, I said.

It’ll be hot even at night, she said. Any other questions?

I couldn’t think of any questions, actually didn’t know enough to have questions to ask.

She bid me good luck and left the room.

The Dane went down the bar to tend to other patrons and I pulled my cell phone, got through to Arlo Taylor’s personal secretary. Said his name was Sir Humphrey Bellingham. Really? Said they would put me up at the Savoy, right there near Trafalgar Square. He sounded self-confident. No nonsense. Said in a minute or so he would fax to me a boarding pass for the British Airways flight from Miami to Heathrow leaving at seven that evening. An eight-hour flight with a six-hour time change would get me there at roughly ten in the morning London time. Sir Humphrey Bellingham said he would be there in a limo to pick me up.

I took the boarding pass from the Dane’s fax machine, gave him my good-byes, and walked back up the coral path to my place on the beach, packed a large duffle, threw in a couple boxes of bullets and my Makarov nine millimeter. The boxes separate from the gun, the clip separate from both of those, and no round in the chamber.

4

The plane was a Boeing 747-400. My seat, courtesy of Arlo Taylor, was in the upper-deck business class. It was a two-seat affair. I had the aisle, and a trim and chic woman was on the window. She wore a khaki skirt that rode just above the knee, a celery-green, two-button polo top, and white sandals. Her hair was blond, short, and worn in a tight curl. Cheeks were high, freckled, and split by a slightly pug nose. The skin was unblemished, had just a hint of pink coloring and was without makup. Calves and biceps appeared sculpted by workout city. Said she was a university English professor and a freelance writer working out of her home in Dublin, said she had been in St. Thomas vacationing with old college chums.

I was dressed in a light blue button down, khakis, and well broken-in but highly shined penny loafers.

Write fiction? I said.

No.

What, I said.

What? she said.

What do you write?

Whatever on Earth interests me.

She spoke with a beautiful Irish lilt that confirmed her heritage, but the tone had a side note that said something else was going on.

Have an interest at the moment? I said.

She turned to face me and her lips broke into a lovely smile.

Pirates, she said.

I must have looked confused. I felt astonished. The coincidence was too much. I looked quickly around the cabin to see if there might